Observers of modern jazz have long known about the unique talents of composer and pianist Jason Moran. This fall, it's come into sharp relief that at age 35, he's already done an awful lot with them. Mostly with The Bandwagon, Moran's trio of 10 years, he has developed a deep repertoire of originals and innovative arrangements. The Bandwagon is behind the new Ten, his eighth album as a leader in 11 years. And, oh, yes: He was just surprised with a MacArthur Genius Grant, an award of $500,000 paid out over five years.

Moran and The Bandwagon continued their 10-year anniversary celebration with a week at the Village Vanguard, a venue which has been important to their development. WBGO and NPR Music teamed up to present a live broadcast, on air and online, on Wednesday, Oct. 6. Hear the archived recording above.

As is common in live performances from The Bandwagon, the set used Moran's minidisc player — the unofficial "fourth member" of the group — to spring song clips and other found sounds for the band to improvise over or respond to. An audio collage preceded opener "Another One," an old Mateen composition. "Feedback Pt. 2" featured Jimi Hendrix's feedback from the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967. A cut-and-spliced field holler acted as a mantra to "Life Live Time." Trombonist Ben Gerstein's remix of songs from Black Stars, an early Moran album, segued into a live group improvisation. Tunes from Ten comprised much of the balance of the set list, including de- and reconstructed interpretations of pieces from Thelonious Monk, Conlon Nancarrow and Jaki Byard.

As a pianist, Moran is a distinctive stylist; he combines free improvisation, early jazz techniques and undercurrents of other contemporary music with more mainstream expressions. As a composer and arranger, Moran is an avid conceptualist, apt to deconstruct a jazz standard or assemble new tunes inspired by modern visual art or sampled sounds. Much of that development has come with The Bandwagon as his base; Tarus Mateen is an active, fluid electric bass player — and occasional vocalist, as demonstrated on "Crepuscule With Nellie" — while Nasheet Waits is a versatile modern-day drum hero.

Jason Moran graduated from the same Houston High School for the Performing and Visual Arts as many a talented jazzman, then matriculated to Manhattan School of Music, where he studied with Jaki Byard, Andrew Hill and Muhal Richard Abrams. While still in college, he was invited into saxophonist Greg Osby's band; a few years later, he started making recordings as a leader. Ten years ago, The Bandwagon made its first recording; though they tour frequently, Moran and his band members also remain busy as sidemen.

Moran first played the Village Vanguard with Greg Osby's band in the late 1990s. As a leader, Moran has been playing with The Bandwagon in the West Village club for nearly all of the group's 10 years; in 2002, the group recorded a live album at the venue. For this run, he said he would feature songs from Ten, and also dig into some of the extensive repertoire he's accumulated.

Renee Rosnes has been in the news lately as one half of a jazz power couple: She's married to fellow pianist Bill Charlap, and earlier this year they released the duet album Double Portrait. But she recently made headlines as one quarter of a jazz powerhouse: The Renee Rosnes Quartet. That foursome played a week at the Village Vanguard this September; NPR Music and WBGO were there to record and live broadcast the group both on air and online on Wednesday, Sept. 15.

Let's be clear: Rosnes' talent on the piano is no fraction of anything. She's been on the New York scene for nearly 25 years, enough to play with late jazz legends and develop her own approach in doing so. At the Vanguard, she was full of subtle shadings on lesser-played standards and a few rambunctious originals. There was deep blues feeling and plenty of buttery swing, set forth among a variety of textures from her veteran bandmates. With Rosnes for her Vanguard run are the silky vibraphonist Steve Nelson and the reliable hookup of bassist Peter Washington and drummer Lewis Nash.

Raised in Vancouver, Rosnes moved to New York in the mid-1980s. Within years, she was playing in the bands of Joe Henderson, Wayne Shorter and J.J. Johnson, among others. Her self-titled 1989 debut album features such guest stars as Shorter, Branford Marsalis and Herbie Hancock. She's gone on to make more than 10 additional albums under her name, recording for a while on Blue Note Records, and to join the all-star SFJAZZ collective at its inception.

Rosnes is no stranger to the Vanguard, either as a sideperson or a bandleader. Her weeklong residency gave her the chance to exercise the latter capacity among frequent collaborators, a group of musicians she'll be taking on a brief West Coast tour later in 2010.